Resurreccion of Steel
by Ryurasuke
Summary: Several generations after the death of Aizen, the Hogyoku has done much more damage in Hueco Mundo that anybody could have predicted. Arrancars are more populous now than ever before, and every one a thousand times more dangerous.
1. Chapter 1

**Time for a dump posting! A chapter for each of my stories! RxR Everybody! You know I live for reviews! And Happy Halloween!**

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The roof of Las Noches, more a home than many others could find, even in rooms where they'd spent their entire lives. There weren't many who could understand. Luckily, he knew that his family would understand him. At least, a few of them would. His father most certainly would. He was pretty sure that despite the rest of their individual insanities, they still considered him to be off his rocker.

It was no matter. He was absolutely and completely fascinated with the world here. Most of the arrancars grew bored and distasteful of the simple monotony of the unchanging world.

But not Rizuka. Hours upon hours, days, he was most often found on the rooftop of Las Noches. He slept up there to ensure that he never missed anything of interest. His hawk-eyed acuity aided him greatly in this.

If it existed in Hueco Mundo, he had almost certainly seen it at least once. But no matter how much he'd seen it all, it still fascinated him.

"Ranmyamo, Have I ever told you only reason I'm not an Espada?" He said as a smile crossed his lips. He was completely alone on the rooftop. "I don't like the uniform." Then he burst into laughter. He went dead silent soon after. "Yeah well shut up! I'm more than strong enough to fight whatever those things are. Shini, er, death somethings. What's that? Oh right, soul rappers."

He felt a presence as it react to his increase in his power. One of the espada. He gave up trying to control his reiatsu, which immediately shot up high, into the level of the espada, and then dropped down into pathetic levels with almost no power to be sensed whatsoever.

Rizuka was a special case in terms of power. At one point, he could hold more power inside of him than many of the espada, but the very next, he might have so little power that his hierro was almost non-existent and his ceros were pathetic.

It reflected his mind perfectly. At any point, he could be perfectly safe and sane, the very next instant he might flash into a burst of anger and kill somebody, ally or enemy.

The presence he felt hadn't actually come in response to him. It was the sexta espada, Hikari Dullort.

He'd hadn't had many encounters with her.

"It amazes me how you guys can live in so much inhospitability." He heard her soft voice. As he watched her crouch down by a small mound of the Hueco Mundo.

Rizuka approached her from behind and made several observations. She was pretty tall for a girl, analyzing the dimensions of her body, Rizuka determined that she was about 5'9," only four inches shorter than he himself. She had long green hair cascading down her back to her waist, the perfect length to reach her belt with the longest locks. On her right hip was a long, four foot katana with a silver and blue wrapped hilt. The hilt added almost another foot to the weapon.

On the left side of her face, there was a twisted piece to her mask. Starting at her chin, it wound its way among itself and intertwined through its own branches and made its way up and around the left curve of her lip. The area around her lips was shaped into a long fang dripping down over her chin for at least three inches.

She was dressed in arrancar white, but with a unique twist, as did most of the arrancars. Hers was the average, but much more revealing. Her back, and front were both open flesh, from just below her breasts down to waist on both front and back. There was also a rather steep dip in her top, revealing quite a lot of her decently sized bosom. Her sides were still clothed though. It would be one thing had she simply had her midriff bare the entire way around, but with her sides covered, it just made her seem even more unique.

Rizuka liked unique.

He slipped up directly behind her before speaking. "They really are amazing, aren't they?"

She didn't jump, but the coalescing of her spirit energy showed him how much he had startled her. She continued to look at the little hollows crawling out and burrowing into the sand, thinking carefully about her response.

Before she managed to complete it, Rizuka was kneeling beside her, digging his hands into the sand. He pulled one of the lizards out and wrapped his strong fingers about the things throat to hold it up in the air. "So small, yet from them stems all of the other hollow lives. At least, the non-sentient lives. Could you imagine if we, the arrancars had the ability to gorge ourselves on the spirit energy floating around us? In the ground below us? There would be no point to our hunting the human spirits, And without us hunting humans, would there be a reason for the shinigami to hunt us in turn?"He chuckled softly.

She just stared at him for a moment, before she sighed. "Does it really matter?"

"Hmm?" He tipped his head to signal her to continue the thought.

"What you said. It might be true, but does it really matter? So what if we might not need to go to war?" She shrugged. "So what if we wouldn't have to hunt them? Thinking about all of these good things isn't going to help us in the slightest. We hunt and kill humans, shinigami hunt and kill us, it's the simple order of our existence."

"Simple hypothetical."

"Well, it would be amazing if we could go without having to fight. To live simple lives like these creatures. I would love to need to fight no more than they."

"What if I told you that it is possible?"

"I'd call you a liar." She giggled.

"Oh, but it is." Rizuka grinned. "My father has worked many long nights with his associates to attempt to make it possible, and already their work has had tremendous advances. Already, myself, among some of the primer espada's fraccion have the ability to empower ourselves simply by absorbing latent reishi in the air around us. Soon, they may even have the capacity to gift us with the ability to feed from the action."

"That'd be a dream come true. To live lives of peace rather than only war." She sighed contentedly. "It would be better than a dream. To not have to be ready to fight at a moment's notice."

"War is our lives."

"But you just said we might be able to move past that?"

"Not yet though."

Hikari was confused about the path their conversation had taken. It seemed like at every turn, he was continually trying to his hardest to simply confuse her. "You're something else aren't you?"

Rizuka chuckled softly before it turned into a deep belly laugh. "You have no idea. I'm perfectly one of a kind."

Many of the arrancars and espada were only mere husks, shells of power lacking personality. Others seemed almost carbon copies of the prior generations of arrancars. Rizuka, there was no other. The had never been an arrancar like him, and there never would be. He was the result of a group of hollows all combining, he had been near to the rank of vasto lorde, despite his instability. One of the most powerful things in the world was his essence, madness. Insanity, the power of being crazy. It was the force behind his entire family's power.

"I'm Hikari, Hikari Dullort." She held her hand out to him.

"I know. sexta espada. You've got two fraccion of your own." Rizuka chuckled. "I am Rizuka. First son and fraccion of Ranulf Niasr." He shook her hand firmly.

"Never heard of you."

"I'm his gold hand of death. Not many have. I am a secret weapon of his. His most reliable tool." He had no problem with referring to himself as an item. Truth be told, he recognized that all four of them, each of Ranulf's children were only tools and weapons.

"That's not very big in family values, don't you think?"

Rizuka shook his head. "He is a scientist and a genius. Family plays no role in our family. In addition, he is only our family because he experiments on us. At least, myself and Mestipho he does. The others not so much."

"Mestipho..." Hikari thought for a second. "Now that's somebody I've heard of. He's the crazy handcuffed one?"

"Ah, so you do know some of my family!"

"Yeah, you all seem right off the deep end."

"Thank you."

Rizuka's power leapt crazy high in a small spurt of energy before settling back down momentarily. It was rather entertaining to watch her reaction at the very least. Her breasts bounced some and a few strands of her hair fell down sensually over her eyes. All in all, Rizuka most definitely approved.

"Well then." Hikari looked around them, searching for the source of the power flexing. "What the hell was that?"

"I'm sorry." Rizuka grinned. "That energy was from me. I have very little control over my own energy. I do not need to. When I'm around, danger tends to disappear."

"You sound like the kind to back in a fight."

"I control Mestipho."

This confused the hell out of Hikari. "Um, what the hell does that mean?"

"Wait until you meet him in truth and you'll learn just what that means." Rizuka grinned. "It's much more than it sounds."

"Is that like asking me out on a date?"

"If you like to think of it that way." He started to squeeze his left hand. He had never actually let the lizard go from so long ago, keeping a hand wrapped around its throat the entire time. He started to steadily apply pressure, his iron fingers digging into the creature.

Hikari's eyes widened at his throttling of the reptile. The lizard began struggling within moments of pressure being applied by his fingers. It could sense the deadly threat of his hands intending its death. Rizuka had no qualms about killing it. He had no qualms about killing another arrancar, why would he be concerned over the death of so small an animal?

Hikari wasn't exactly worried about the animal's life, but with Rizuka, who could tell if he would move on in another step and throttle her next? "Um, y-you're hurting it."

"Life hurts." Rizuka chuckled as he released the animal.

Hikari breathed a sigh of relief. He may not have been an espada, but if luck was with him and his power skyrocketed again, it was entirely possible that he could kill her. And she found that she rather enjoyed life.

"If you'll beg my pardon, I find that my espada is calling me. I look forward to our next meeting." He chuckled and used his sonido to disappear.

Hikari looked back down at the lizards scurrying about below her. "Rizuka Niasr," She whispered. "Seems interesting at the very least."

And intrigue her he did. He intrigued her very much.


	2. Chapter 2

Ranulf was busily engaged with one of the other espada. Barely higher than a person's knee, the four year old was one of the smartest people alive. A perfect complement to Ranulf's own genius. Nobody with half a brain could actually believe that he was a four year old however. He was espada, he did not age, he took whichever body was most pleasing to him. And that body just happened to be a child of no more than four.

Appa Shieron was a genius, however little he appeared to be one. Or acted like one. He was a child in soul and mind.

Long blue hair framed his innocent face, coming to a rest with the longest strands just brushing against his shoulders. He wore typical arrancar robes, but with an addition rather than an alteration. He wore a long, full sized adult's lab coat. Soft but brutal green eyes stood out under the almost pretty fringe of his bangs. A large scalpel was strapped to his side, partially hidden by the lab coat. It was barely a foot long but nobody would even think to make a declaration about his being weak. He was espada primer. The most powerful besides the cerada. And nobody would ever dare to compare anybody to the cerada.

Appa was a cute little kid, a little sick and twisted, but in Las Noches, who wasn't? The more twisted the individual, the more powerful they were as well. At least, that was how Rizuka had noted it all. It held up to be true, but some instances of their twistedness were rather hard to observe. Many of them seemed almost normal.

Take the cerada espada for example, he appeared completely normal. Anybody who had interacted with him though, could see just how disturbed he was. He was the one who caused many of the others to go insane.

It was difficult to even speak with him, as he had only his concerns on his mind. He did not care should somebody die; he did not care in most cases about what happened.

Rizuka turned his mind back on topic. "Ranulf, you summoned me?"

"Ah, yes, Rizuka." Ranulf pondered for a moment why he had called for his first. "Oh yes, that's right." He snapped his fingers and ran his hands down along a row of vials filled with highly varying colors. "I had a serum for you to test. Roll up your sleeve and lower your power."

Rizuka slid up his right sleeve and tried his hardest to rein his reiatsu in. Which only really meant that his power wouldn't fluctuate quite as much.

With his power dimmed some, Ranulf would be able to puncture his skin with more ease with his needle. He prepared the serum, flipping the vial over and inserting the needle through the thin protective layer. With the needle prepared, he faced Rizuka. "Let's make some magic."

Ranulf pushed the plunger, injecting a stream of some unknown fluid into Rizuka's body, which immediately began to warm.

Unknown to his subjects, here was the major differing point between himself and Appa as scientists. Appa loved to experiment, but he was still a child about it. He was more into the thought of enjoying the action of dissecting and experimenting. Ranulf only lived for progress. Appa conducted his experiments on any subject he managed to get his hands on; Ranulf always tested all of his experiments first on himself before anybody else.

The fluid caused all of Rizuka's senses to immediately go through a rapid, but short-lived improvement of the highest caliber. Everything became a thousand times clearer, more distinct. Each and every one of Ranulf's long black hair was individualized under his newfound visual prowess. Long strands, long enough to fall down to the middle of his back down his spine.

The predatory yellow eyes were stridently clear within his gaze, and the midnight oil sclera surrounding his irises showed his absolute insanity. Within those dark vaults of void, one could easily be lost, trapped within one's own head, yet at the mercy of his pleasure.

The arrancar robes, made of one material, a part of the arrancars as much as their masks were, were the next location his eyes fell upon. Ranulf's robes were perfectly skintight, except for the hood of the clothing which was loose over his head. Of the same consistency of cloth, but nothing alike. They could be parted, the arrancar and their robes but both would be lessened by the separation. It was interesting. Rizuka moved his gaze along.

Upon his father's back were his brother's weapons. A perfect trap, it made it appear that Ranulf used multiple different sorts of battle styles. From the large four-bladed punch dagger on his upper left shoulder to a long spear that reached from a prominent point protruding over his shoulder by almost half a foot all the way down to near his opposite ankle, to the huge hilted sword-like weapon on his hip and the short hafted spear on his opposite hip, he appeared quite the unspecialized brawler.

With his senses improved to this level, he turned then to look at Appa. The same sort of details were revealed to him under the circumstances. Incredible details standing out. Shoulder length soft blue hair, yellow green irises, the blue swirls at the outer corner of each of his eyes, the fibers making up his lab coat, the intricate designs over all of the handles of the scalpels, no detail too small to escape him, nor to avoid his notice for even a moment.

Ranulf examined Rizuka for any outward changes from his serum. A slight flush as his blood flow increased, but given how pale Rizuka usually was, that might not be anything of any real note. He finally had some color to it, a much better tone than he usually had.

"How do you feel?" Ranulf said patiently, picking up a clipboard and pen to take notes.

Rizuka had always thought of the difference between his father and Appa of the difference between a scientist and a medical examiner. Appa was a scientist, experiment as if his subjects weren't sentient. Ranulf knew that his patients were living, and treated them as such. That's not to say that he was by any means gentle with his experiments, but he at least recognized that a truly emotionless approach to it would yield less accurate results.

Rizuka thought about his response before daring to answer, he wanted the best answers to aid his father as much as possible. "It appears to have exponentially improved my sensory capacity, at least a threefold improvement, very likely even more powerful an alteration. My skin has gone up a few degrees at least, and I suspect that my power may have almost doubled across the board. Whether this is a temporary boost or permanent, we'll have to wait for my power to stabilize to determine."

Ranulf noted all of this down in his notepad and thought about the implications. The plan for the serum was to make the ability of absorbing reishi latent from the sands of Hueco Mundo. As it was, his family was only able to draw the power into themselves if they spent time building up the ability. If he could manage to make this serum perfected, then it would be something that just happened.

"No negative side effects seen in either test subject so far." Ranulf noted.

Before he could continue, a deep voice reverberated through the halls of Las Noches. "Espada, please, come to the meeting chamber as soon as possible. I have needs to be attended to."

The Cerada's voice made Ranulf sneer with anger. "Rizuka, gather your siblings, join me in the meeting."

Rizuka ducked into a bow and stepped out of the room, still adjusting to the new enhancements to his senses. The walk seemed to take longer than it had ever before, but at the same time, he realized that he was faster than he'd ever been able to move before. He continued walking until he arrived at his father's room. A massive suite with several rooms set up for each of the four fraccion.

The main room was a large open chamber in which much of their time was spent. A large couch took up the main portion of the sitting room, set aside like one could find in any human household. Perpendicular to it was a singular, plush chair, one that was only very seldom used. The only one who ever sat in the chair was Rizuka, and he only rarely ever sat in any case.

In usual form, his 'sister,' and 'brother' were in their usual seating arrangement on the couch. Ranulf had only actually had a hand in Rizuka's and Mestipho's births, Rikka and Zelgius were only called their family, in actuality, they just arrancars who had sworn themselves to Ranulf's cause.

Rikka, his sister, was leaning up against one side of the couch. Zelgius sat on the opposite end from her, leaning back with his arms flung over the couch's back. Rikka used his thighs as a foot rest.

In the back of the room was much less light. And in one of the darkest corners, a midnight shadow darker than the rest of the lightless region twitched and quivered. The hiding place of the fourth fraccion, their last brother, Mestipho.

Locked up, hands captured within golden manacles, attached to a nearly twenty foot long chain, Mestipho was the epitome of insanity. As with the other members of the family, the insanity only added to their strength. As such, Mestipho was the clear winner in terms of raw strength. Rizuka heard the telltale gnawing sound, allowing him to know that his brother was trying to chew his way through the chain restricting his absolute power. Luckily, his father had created the chain, and it was nigh-unbreakable.

"Father requires our presence. The Cerada desires to meet with all of the espada, and father wishes for us to accompany him." Rizuka dictated clearly.

Rikka sighed loudly as she stood, pressing the points of her high heeled thigh highs into Zelgius's thigh, making him edge nervously away from the pressure. Zelgius grimaced, nervous about where she was placing the dangerous footwear. He stood up once she had gotten herself disentangled from the couch.

"Dammit girl, you'll going to kill me if you keep doing that." He grunted with a grin.

Rikka grinned as well, a twist appearing on the corner of her lips. She loved to torture him, it was funny, and all of his reactions were humorous. He clearly enjoyed her presence, and made no secret of it, but when she did things like that, he was always afraid that she might hit a little too hard on that , given who she was, was a pretty rational assumption.

Each of the siblings was an aspect of insanity, as was their father too. Rizuka was chaos, spontaneity and the absoluteness of pure randomness; Rikka was like the ice, cold as steel and cruel in her fickleness; Zelgius was the callous enjoyment of the simple things; Mestipho was the purest insanity of them all, the raw and naked insanity of the mad, that sureness of self that only the truly crazy could find within themselves; and their father, their father was a simplified version of insanity.

He was the insanity found when one was out for revenge. But also, when he needed more power, he was able to absorb the insanity and power from his children. There was very little that could overpower their powers combined and headed by their father's intelligence.

Rizuka led the way, holding firmly onto Mestipho's chain to ensure that he didn't go into anywhere that they didn't desire him to go. At one point, he had to give a heavy tug to keep him from barging into the women's showering facilities.

Zelgius burst into a fit of laughter at that.

"You're terrible." Rikka chuckled, giving his shoulder a light push. "How much would you give me if I could sneak you in there for an hour or two?"

"An hour or two of joy, if you're ready for it." He chuckled in response.

"Tempting." She grinned.

"Shut up, we're here." Rizuka snapped as he opened the door. The espada were seated calmly around a long table. At its head was the deadliest force in Hueco Mundo. Three to his left, and four on his right, the placement of the espada.

They all headed in, with Rikka closing the door after they headed into the room. The raw power filling the room was almost like a viscous mass. The cerada alone was powerful enough to keep the air like a jelly, but with the other espada in the room as well, it seemed as if the air were pushing back against the fraccion. And the fraccion were by no means weak in any way.

The cerada oozed confidence, his aura was oppressive and literally slammed against the others in the room. He sat calmly in his seat, leaned back in his chair like the king of the world. His robes were black, like only one other of the arrancars, another of the espada's. Black robes should have been reminiscent of the shinigami, but oddly enough, neither of the black clothed arrancars appeared anything like their sworn enemies, they were both clearly arrancars.

The cerada espada wore average pants, loose and billowing, paired with a long tattered jacket that he wore open to reveal his abdomen. At each wrist, ankle and around his neck was a patch of red fur. Over the areas of his body that weren't covered by the small amounts of clothing were tribal tattoos, curling and twisting over and back on itself. A black hollow mask covered the upper portion of his face, from his cheekbones up to his hairline. Sprouting from the mask was a broken horn, with the torn edge being shaven down to a smooth edge.

Immediately to his right was an empty chair where Appa would soon be sitting, once he got around to making his way into the room. Directly across from him, at the first left hand chair was Ranulf's, their father, chair.

Next to Appa sat the tricera espada, Raven Nicodo. She wore a simple wrap holding down her impressive chest, matched to a pair of the full arrancars pants, with long slits from her knees up to hips. A white bunch of midnight cloth kept her clothing from slipping off of her. Below her luscious breasts sat her hollow hole, perfectly centered and partially covered by her mounds. Her hollow mask made itself known as a tight choker that gripped delicately, and yet still tightly around her seemingly delicate throat. On the right side of her face, from hairline to her chin, even over her eyelids was a single black line.

Her long indigo hair was tied back into a long ponytail that cascaded down her spine. By far the most exotic features were her eyes. Her irises were perfectly unique, with a star of blue spreading out from her pupils, matched with a red star pointing between the prongs of blue. It was yet another girl whom intrigued Rizuka incredibly.

Beside Raven sat Akuma. Akuma was an enigma. He wasn't very powerful, even the least among Ranulf's fraccion could outmatch him with their raw reiatsu, but he never showed the faintest hint of emotion. There was something about him. Never afraid of anything, never happy, sad, nothing. Everything about him spoke of his utter carelessness.

He was dressed in a long, loose, open, black vest, and loose pants that resembled silks from the Middle East of the human world.

His hair was a loose tumble of silver strings, light and flowing, that flooded down his back wildly. His eyes were blood red rings around his pupils, with the sclera showing the obvious signs of drinking. His eyes appeared bruised and bloodshot, with dark rings staining the soft flesh. But his eyes overall were clear and showed his lack of enthusiasm.

Set up above his eyes, under a light, loose layer of his hair was an oval shaped black hollow mask. His hollow hole wasn't exactly hidden, but it was only visible when his vest happened to shift just right to reveal the lower part of his abdomen, on the right side. It wasn't very large, being no larger around than his wrist, showing his remarkable control over his primal instincts.

The last of the espada to the right was a new espada that Rizuka didn't recognize offhand. She must have been a newly created arrancar, helped out by the cerada in very recent time. Rizuka kept firm tabs on all happenings within Hueco Mundo, studying every detail, no matter how small. One day, he'd even gone so far as to try to count every grain of sand within the empty world. He'd gotten up to 5,493 before business called him away. He planned to return to the task at some point to know the final number.

He shook his head to clear it of distractions, what had he been thinking of? _Oh yes, the last espada to the right._ He looked back at her, noting each individual detail with delight.

Her robes were rather standard, long and full enough to cover her body completely, somewhat tight where the clothing covered her abdomen, but then becoming looser as it spread out down her limbs. The one oddity of her clothing was that she appeared as a mockery of the shinigami. Her robes were covered by yet another robe, one almost exactly like the haori's worn by the shinigami division captains.

She had not-so-unique purple eyes. At one point in history, purple eyes had been a rarity, incredibly rare even, but now, with so much selective breeding, it wasn't quite common among humans, but it wasn't as unique as it had been once. Among the dead, it was much the same. Her hair was black and fell down to touch upon her shoulders from its place in the ponytail.

Across her nose, nearly from ear-to-ear was the long piece of bone that was her hollow mask. A layer of bandages covered her left hand from knuckles until it was hidden amidst the cloth of her robes. Most striking among her features was the musical staff across her eyes, from just above her mask piece, up to her hairline.

That was something that had always interested Rizuka, although even he had to admit that his mind was interested by the most random assortment of things.

Why did all of the arrancars have an approximation of makeup on their faces? Even Rizuka himself, and his family all had it as well. Rizuka himself had 3 concentric cobalt blue rings at each of his temples. Mestipho had a faint approximation of jagged teeth under his bottom lip; Zelgius was marked by green and black shadowing his eyelids, and Rikka wore blue shadow on her upper eyelids, as well as on her lips.

It was an interesting detail that Rizuka would need to remember to ask his father. He was always smarter, and better at figuring things like that out. Of course, it was a pretty inconsequential detail anyway.

To the left of the cerada, next to Ranulf, was one of the scarier espada. Zankai Zennyo-Ryuo, the segunda espada. He was the essence of one of the former espada, the cuatro espada, Ulquiorra Schifer. He appeared the same as Ulquiorra as well, with incredibly pale skin matched with the somewhat loose arrancar robes.

The only real differences were in the makeup and mask pieces, at least at first glance. Instead of a part helmet, his mask piece were a thousand little edges on the ends of his hair in little bunches. Down both sides of his face, from his eyes down to his chin, were three bright green lines.

He was impeccably neat, a detail that made him even more intimidating for some reason.

Seated next to Zankai was Hikari, whom Rizuka could now identify easier the details that made her particularly unique. A row of silver teardrops down her right cheek, her green hair feathered out down her back, bunched at the base of her spine. Each strand was perfect in his vision, and he just continued to stare for a moment, enjoying her beauty.

That only lasted a moment before the cerada announced his intent in gathering them all into the group. He had only been waiting for Appa to arrive.

"Hello everybody." The cerada's soft voice cut through the underlying murmur of noise of the other espada. "It is a pleasure to make the acquaintance of all of you. I know that I myself, know each and every individual one of you, some more intimately than others. Now it's time for each of you to meet one another. Everybody, introduce yourselves, say something about what makes you who you are, and most importantly, tell us your goals?"

Dead silence was his first answer. The espada hadn't been prepared for that sort of request from so powerful a being.

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**Alright everybody, finally finished the second chapter. Took longer than I'd thought. Of course, the 15 page essay I had to write didn't help, but I live for my fans! Oh boy, I'm that much a loser... Sorry for my depressive mood, I do believe that I'm in the midst of a depression, but whatever...**


	3. Chapter 3

**Well everybody, here's the latest chapter out for Resurreccion of Steel. My life honestly just keeps getting worse and worse, and I think my writing's starting to reflect that. I'm not sure if I should even bother continuing to write...**

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"Come on now, no need to be shy," The cerada chuckled at their fears. For it was fear. The espada were frightened to recognized for who, and more importantly what, they were. "We could always go by number if you would prefer? It's taken me quite some time, and no small amount of effort to gather together your ranks properly. Now everybody make nice or I'll annihilate you."

The simple fact that he was so confident in his ability to do so made an equal number of the arrancar nervous and humored.

Some of them, such as Raven and Ranulf, were among those simply amused by him. They didn't know fear, couldn't understand it, and as such, simply didn't recognize that they should. Others like Appa thought themselves above such meager things, realizing what fear was but simply ignoring it. Then some were like Hikari and Serra, whom the cerada was clearly more powerful than. The only other reactions were the ones from the arrancar like Akuma, who simply felt nothing, nothing at all.

"Then I suppose it's all up to me. Let's start with our lowest rank. The eighth espada. Fraccion identify yourself immediately after your espada." The cerada commanded.

_Of course it has to be me,_ Serra though, with several unsavory thoughts about the cerada and his parentage dancing about as well. She brushed her loose robe back. "M-my name is Serra." _Good job there moron, start out with a stutter to show them how strong you are._ "I exist as the septima espada, of the aspect of greed. I desire to become powerful enough to be me and ignore anybody who tries to influence my decisions. I want to become perfectly independent from all others. I will become more powerful! All of the power, all of the might, all of it will be mine!"

The cerada laughed heartily at her goals. "Very worthy! You will most certainly be capable of serving in my army." He gestured her to retake her seat.

Her fraccion was next up, a lovely young woman with very revealing attire. Loose translucent black pants that showed her luscious legs quite exquisitely Only barely covering her sex was a very small pair of white panties. Much of her rather ample bust spilled out to be revealed, only barely decent past a small covering over her chest. She may have appeared a child because of her body size, but her bosom more than declared her an adult. She had golden wires trailing about her body in an exotic array. A collar wraps tightly around her throat, studded with dulled garnets, gleamed as she gained her feet. In the center of her forehead was an eye of Osiris, or at least, an imperfect facsimile of one. "Kurayama Harai Ankoku." She said delicately. "I am the primary fraccion to my lady Serra."

"Also seem to have taken an extra name for her." Muttered the other fraccion behind Serra's seat.

"Of course, we're supposed to be greedy of course." She smiled before continuing. "I'm just here to ensure that she makes her dreams reality. That's all I desire for."

"Yes, you're a great servant." The other spoke up again. "And I'm the second fraccion to our glorious mistress, Jason Miracual." He was tall, incredibly tall, taller than any of the others. His robes were tight and covered him completely from his feet up to even cover his lips. His left eye was an open hole, revealing the wall that stood barren behind him, around the hole were several distinctively Egyptian symbols. His other eye was covered with the white mask styled in a web pattern. "I'm here, because, well, where else would an arrancar go? Not like I would be accepted anywhere else right? So I'm stuck in this hellhole until somebody kills me."

"Ah, that's the spirit." The cerada smiled. "I'm planning for the rise of the arrancar, Everything will be ours eventually." He gestured to the next espada.

"Hikari Dullort." She kept herself firmly seated. "Sexta espada. Guilty of the sin of sloth. Unfortunately, neither of my fraccion will be joining us today. They failed me and as such are no longer concerns of any of ours."

The vast majority of the arrancars grew wicked smiles at the implications. Serra's fraccion grew grim as they realized how little they meant in the plans of their betters. Their espada could kill them on a whim, any of the espada could, and none of the others would lift a finger to help them, unless it overlapped their authority. The only one who might step up to save them was their espada, who appeared to have little concern over them.

"I suppose I'm next up." Midnight black and ominous in every aspect of his appearance, instead of fraccion seated behind him, all that stood there was a tall, heavy headed black scythe. "Akuma Calikk, the espada of gluttony. My goal is simple, to annihilate everything, to obliterate everything in existence. Luckily, it's not a very difficult task considering how much everything's working to destroy itself anyway."

"Humanity certainly seemed destined for it doesn't it?" The cerada grinned. "And you now." He pointed down the line.

"Zenkai Zennyo-Ryuo. Pride." He didn't bother to stand. Radiating out from his body was a wave of power. With his calm demeanor and apathy, he and Akuma were the most frightening and dangerous of the espada. They were very close, both tall, thin and pale. The two were truly of a kind, but polar opposites in their appearance. They both had very few concerns, in fact, they both seemed heartless, apathetic.

"Very nice." The cerada smiled. He could feel the power in the room, the fear from some, the calm of others, the confidence of still more. It was quite an assortment. "Next."

Raven was next to her feet, standing firm and ready. "You may refer to me as Raven. I am the espada of lust. I only have one goal, and that is to find someone strong enough to kill me. Someone who will give me a worthy battle before taking my life."

"Ranulf Niasr. Espada of wrath." He didn't even allow for Raven to regain her seat before he started. Every movement he made revealed the vast amounts of power he had stored within his body. His body was built for battle, much like each of the four fraccion standing behind him. They were all thin and each of the men was heavy with muscle. "I just want to annihilate everything that resembles any semblance of order. I want everybody to enjoy the same chaos, the same insanity that my family lives with."

"It really is quite exciting isn't it?" The only female among his fraccion. She was dressed in an open white vest with baggy pants. The vest left very little of her body to the imagination. Her clothing never seemed to flare far enough outward to actually reveal her attributes. She brazenly exposed the hollow hole in the center of her stomach. Her nature was just as easily determined. Her left eyelid and her lips were both stained a bright frozen blue.

"Shush Rikka, we're doing role." Rizuka, spoke up. He was clearly the most dominant of the fraccion under Ranulf. His robes and hair were nearly indistinguishable, long black and white strands blending together in many places. Ragged and torn, he had a truly wild look about him. The left side of his head was adorned with a large, smooth horn. Just a little ways behind each of his temples was a series of three concentric rings of colors. Although he spoke with such authority, his face maintained a look of dreamy innocence. "Wait your turn before you speak. I'm supposed to be the first to speak with my name and goals after father."

"Don't talk like that to her." Yet another responded. This one had an aura of confidence that overwhelmed the air around him. His clothing matched Rikka's, in that it was a vest and regular pants. His were worn and ragged however. Stretching from ear to ear was a large dominating mask in the shape of a fanged mouth. His wild blue hair fell freely down to his shoulders. He had a very prominent hole attesting his rank as an arrancar, very large, almost the distance from one side to the other of his torso. "It's not always age before beauty," He grinned wildly. "After all, ladies first."

The fraccion in the lead gave a sigh and rubbed at the space marked by the rings. "I suppose it matters very little does it not?"

Serra spoke up, interrupting their _argument_. "Are one of you going to actually introduce yourself?"

"Zelgius Kishii." The third one to speak up began. "I'm the second fraccion to the segunda espada. My goal is to eventually find myself lost in my sweet angel's bedding." He chuckled, nodding his head at the female fraccion.

That signaled for her to speak up next. "I am Rikka Cruvee." She gave a small, breathless chuckle, but the sharper eyed of the arrancar spied that the smile didn't reach her eyes. "My goal is to, you know, I don't think I've ever thought of my goals. It doesn't really matter does it? After all, I'm only a fraccion, I don't matter in the long run of things. "

"Of course it does." The cerada said with a fatherly smile. "All of our goals are equally important."

"I highly doubt that." She muttered.

The lead fraccion spoke up next. "Me llamo Rizuka Niasr. I am the primary fraccion to our father Ranulf. I only wish for his goals to be realized. Whatever goals he desires completed, become the whole of my existence. I will aid him until death becomes me."

Everybody turned to look at the fourth of the fraccion. His only response was to laugh manically. "This is Mestipho." Rizuka explained. "He's not big on talking. His goals are the same as mine."

Mestipho nodded emphatically, before turning his attention to massive manacles that wrapped around both of his hands fully. There was a massive golden chain hooked to the manacles, trailed for quite some distance behind him. His robes were pristine white and full, hanging loosely off of his body. From beneath the long black hair hanging down over her face, two pinpricks of yellow light shone through. His eyes were the wicked yellow of a true predator, surrounded by absolute darkness instead of white, just like the eyes of his father Ranulf.

That only left the primera espada and some fraccion. He stood up on top of his chair and pulled himself up on top of the table. Even with the added height of the table, he was still shorter than nearly all of the others, even while they sat placidly at their own seats.

Despite his height limitations, he still wore full-sized adult robes, coupled with a large lab coat with the addition of a hood that fell down to the middle of his back. The broken shard of his mask stood out prominently over his right cheekbone. His other cheek had a large green number one. Falling down to his shoulder was a very wild blue mess of hair. His yellow-green eyes shone brightly as he declared, "My name is Appa Shieron and I'm bigger than all of you!" He declared loudly, pushing himself up onto his toes. "I am primera espada and I represent envy. My purpose here is to develop myself into a perfect being, but I needs to practice on lots of other people first. So if you ever want to come down to my lab to be an experiment, then go ahead."

"Ooo ooo!" His fraccion each threw their hands high towards him saying, "Me! Me! I will!" They were all young girls, each of them a little taller than he was.

"Shush! It's Appa's turn to talk right now. Don't interrupt or I'll scalpel you."

"Promise?" One of them teased. She was dressed in robes similar to his, too large for their size. Hers were large, but cut to fit her body and bare her midriff. Her dark green hair was a near perfect match to Appa's. On her chin was a line of four green drops.

"Now, where was I?" Appa pondered, pointedly ignoring her question.

"Ooo! I know!" Another of them spoke up. This one had large, expansive, white hair that was tied up into two bulbs atop her head. Between the two bulbs, it probably added up to most of her small body's weight. She wore a large, poofy, ballroom dress, complete with a wire frame petticoat underneath. Hanging down over her lips were numerous curved spikes, like small jagged teeth. Her eyes looked raccoonish, with thick dark rings circling the area. "You were saying you'll take anybody as a volunteer."

"Oh yeah, thank you Momo."

"What do I win?" She asked, tipping her head at him.

"Nothing more than the rest of us." The third of the bunch responded. This one wore overly large robes just like the others of the group. Massive ones that would fit comfortably on a full grown adult. The robes were cut to reveal much of her chest coming down from her clavicle, as well as her midriff. Not exactly proper attire for such a young girl. Hanging down over her eyes and spanning her entire forehead was a winged visor with a deep point hanging down over her nose. Completing the shy image, she had two red circles high on her cheeks like a permanent blush. Her bright pink hair was held up in a ponytail high on her head, with more hanging down loosely about her face and neck. "Because I knew that too!"

"Shush you all. I'll scalpel all of you!" Appa declared, pulling a scalpel out to make his point.

All three girls squealed happily and then devolved into giggling.

"Quiet!" Appa whined loudly. His whine managed to quiet the girls however, which was his most likely intent. "There, now, where was I?" Before any of the three could respond he snapped his fingers. "Oh yeah. So if any of you want to come down, I'll gladly experiment on you. Completely voluntary however. I would never subject anybody to anything I didn't want to."

And with that, he turned away and sat back in seat. His fraccion each leapt to their fee, struggling to get themselves in front of the others so they could be the first to introduce themselves. They each wanted to be first, but Appa finally made the decision for them. "Do it in order!"

"Fiiiine!" Moaned the second one to speak, Momo.

"I'm Miza! Miza Hayamii." The green one giggled. "I want Appa to do lots of experiments on me! Lots and lots of them! And then maybe he'll fall in love in with me!"

"No!" The one unnamed one declared. "He's gonna fall in love with me! Nel Tiarr! I'm his real love!"

"Nu-uh!" Momo nearly shrieked. "Momo Haraa is! I'm better than either of you, he's gonna love me!"

"Appa just wants to experiment." The espada explained simply.

"Too bad!" All three of them shouted his protest down.

"All worthy goals to the individuals I'm sure." The cerada chuckled softly. He pushed himself to his feet. "As I'm sure you all know, my name is Ayaka Chiyoko. I only wish for all of your goals to be fulfilled." He spread his arms wide. "I am all of your hatred, I am all of the hatred at you, I am all of the hatred from you. I am the hatred at the death of a lover. I am the hatred from a mother when her child is born, as well as when the child is slain. I am the hatred when a crime occurs, and I am the hatred at those who uphold the law. I am hatred in its purest form, and I am the cerada espada. Now let's see what we can do to make your dreams reality."

He lead them away, snapping his fingers at the back of the chamber and opening the black void of a garganta. "We're going on a fieldtrip."

The open maw of the garganta stared the arrancars down. None of them wanted to be the first one through, whether out of respect for the cerada, or out of fear.


End file.
